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The Monastery of Sveti Jovan Bigorski, high up in a pass in the Šar Mountains that separate western Macedonia from Albania, was on our road from Ochrid to Tetovo in the northern plains of Macedonia. This is really the way to drive through the country if you want mountain scenery as gorgeous as any in the Balkans, as opposed to down the central Vardar valley. The monastery is dedicated to St. John the Baptist and though the Macedonian Orthodox Church is led by the Archbishop of the church-glutted lakeside town of Ochrid and has its seat in Skopje, this monastery is so important that it’s sort of the heart of Orthodox Macedonia. Unfortunately, we arrived just as vespers were starting, so we couldn’t talk to anybody about the monastery, and our schedule didn’t allow us to stay through vespers, which is also unfortunate because the interior of the main church is stunning as well. No pictures allowed though.

If looking at the pictures below, it appears that the monastery complex is in super good condition, that’s because it is. Most of the complex, except for the church itself, burnt down in 2009 and has since been rebuilt (like the administrative buildings of the Patriarchate in Istanbul, which burnt down in the 40s and for which permission to rebuild was only granted by the Turkish Republic in the 1990s). This is a kind of Ottoman tradition: build in wood, suffer repeated fires like the kind that wiped out whole districts of Istanbul throughout its history and killed tens of thousands. Then rebuild in wood again. It’s not known who said that the definition of neurosis is repeating the same action over and over and expecting a different result, but it also might be the definition of stupidity. Only after a fire destroyed two thirds of Pera in 1870 in just six hours did people in those predominantly Christian and Jewish areas start building in masonry, which is why those neighborhoods are architecturally far older today than those of the now ugly two-thousand-year-old city on the original peninsula, where there is almost no old domestic architecture left (except, again, in former minority neighborhoods, for some reason, like Fanari or Balata or Samatya). The fires also did create the famous Istanbul tradition of thetulumbacı(the “tube” or “hose” men? like the name of the dessert?) volunteer firefighters who were supposedly the great pallikaria of their mahallades, but just as often engaged in looting and robbing while doing their heroic duty. NONE of this is a swipe at the Ottomans, Turks or Muslims. Apparently the late Byzantines built domestic structures in wood as well — as did and do the Japanese, a culture I’d have no reason to mock.

And speaking of the Japanese… The thought occurred to me at Sveti Jovan that just rebuilding things when they get too shabby or structurally rotted and dangerous is not such a bad thing. The Japanese, for example, have a completely different concept of authenticity than we do. If the Katsura, the Imperial Villa complex in Kyoto (below) seems to be in great shape even though it dates from the seventeenth century, it’s because, as with other ancient structures in Japan, the Japanese have no problem with just replacing old or rotting wooden structures with new ones piece by piece as necessary. So the Katsura is — materially speaking or in our terms — really not that old at all; parts of it might be what we would consider brand new, in fact.

(click on bottom two)

So what’s wrong with rebuilding the monastery structures of a complex like Sveti Jovan? The stone is usually immune. And if the rest is just wood and çatma and plaster anyway, why not replace it when it starts to go?

Back to Macedonia… Sveti Jovan is the most impressive Orthodox monastery I’ve been in outside of Athos. Nothing in Greece, Kosovo, or even Russia compares. In fact, I would say that if any Orthodox — or any — woman wants to get an impression of what the great, sprawling monastic palace-fortresses of the Holy Mountain are like, then a visit to Sveti Jovan is mandatory. Here are some pics; the last two of the church’s famous iconostasis were lifted from on-line. (Click on all.)

From Bosnia to Bengal – the purpose of this blog

I'm Nicholas Bakos, a.k.a. "NikoBako." I'm Greek (Roman really, but only a handful of people today fully understand what I'm talking about when I say that, so I use "Greek" for shorthand). I'm from New York. I live all over the place these days. The rest should become obvious from the blog.